Before and After

[tchristman]

I have always wanted to have a dedicated frag tank and I now I do. It is not large (24 x 24 x 16) but I am very pleased with it. The space that I had to use was limited unless I was going to move my 210. The frag tank replace my top off container so the wife is happy.

Please excuse the dirty look of the frag tank since my mag float for acrylic will be here tomorrow. The other tank is glass and I do not want to take any chances of scratching it.

The big green water container was and still is my top off water container. The cords that you may or may not see in between the tanks will disappear when my digital 6 plug timer gets here sometime this week. The top off container now sits inside the frag tank cabinet. The frag tank cabinet was built by Dustin RedEDGE2k1. We went back and forth on the design and faced a couple of obstacles but I could not be happier with his work. The front of the cabinet is secured with magnets and removable to access the water storage tank. In the pictures the flash makes the stain look very different when in fact it is not. It is a little darker as I must have left it on longer or the original stand could have faded over a few years. Either way it does not look as bad in person as it does in the pictures.

Tim

Sometimes you do not really notice how bad things look until you do them right and you look back and say, "yikes".
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[drnecropolis]

That looks really awesome!

 

[marko22]

Setup looks awesome. Great frag tank setup too.

 

[kayakatl]

Wow... I love it. It is beautiful. Nice job hiding that ATO tank too.

 

[grouper therapy]

Two nice tanks . Excellent job!! I really like your frag shelves

 

[purplegorilla]

Very nice, I had a 30 gallon trash bin as my top off container in my living for almost a year. :confused2:

 

[corigan]

Great looking setup Tim. Man that really opened up your display.

 

[skriz]

Big improvement, Tim..looks good!

 

[weaglereefer]

Did you paint white eggcrate, or use black eggcrate? I found that not all plugs fit in the black eggcrate from BRS.

 

[twocute2b4u]

Yeah, where did you get the black egg crate and PVC? I really like how you put the ATO in the stand for the frag tank! Looks really nice.

 

[rededge2k1]

Tim forgot to mention that the ATO container is on castors and can be rolled completely out from underneath the frag tank stand for filling. Whoever built that stand must be awesome!

Oh yeah, I can't forget to thank Son of Adam (Scott) for welding the metal support brace for me at 6pm on a Friday evening. Thanks Scott!

Dustin

 

[rededge2k1]

Ok one more post Tim and I promise I'll give you your thread back!

The SketchUp design showing the removable front panel & roll-out ATO dolley:

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[serpent]

I love the tanks. The stand is genius. How did you get the support you needed for the tank while allowing the ATO dolly to roll out?

 

[rededge2k1]

serpent;457868 wrote: I love the tanks. The stand is genius. How did you get the support you needed for the tank while allowing the ATO dolly to roll out?

It's not shown in the model because it was something I engineered after the stand was built (when I realized the needed strength could not be achieved with wood), but if you look in Tim's pictures at the beginning of this thread you will see the 1.5" tube steel brace I installed in the front of the cabinet. It's an inverted U-shaped brace that makes the stand solid as a rock and worked like a charm. It also takes up far less room than plywood supports would have.

Dustin

 

[son of adam]

RedEDGE2k1;457619 wrote: Tim forgot to mention that the ATO container is on castors and can be rolled completely out from underneath the frag tank stand for filling. Whoever built that stand must be awesome!

Oh yeah, I can't forget to thank Son of Adam (Scott) for welding the metal support brace for me at 6pm on a Friday evening. Thanks Scott!

Dustin

Nice work guys thats really looking good.

 

[dave green]

Now that's cool!

 

[tchristman]

The black pvc came from Savko. I have some left over if anyone needs any. I was going to plumb the frag tank with the black pvc back to the main tank but it was too tight of quarters. The black eggcrate is from BRS. I love that stuff. I have added some snails to keep the algae down on the frag tank bottom. I would prefer to stay bare bottom in the frag tank but I may go to sand. Thanks everyone for their comments. The Geissemann Infinity is a great fixture but the etailer that sold it to me said that it only had one power cord coming from the top and it has two. Wish I could do something with the cords. I am thinking on that one and would love some suggestions.

 

[corigan]

Stick with the barebottom on your frag tank Tim. Looks great man. I can't believe how much more open your display tank looks without all the egg-crating in it.

Matt

 

[rededge2k1]

I agree....sand sounds like a nightmare in a shallow, high flow frag tank.

Dustin

 

[jcusmarine]

Great job...very well done.